Dutch Ban Voting Machines (Returning to Paper Ballots)

[kster]

By Egan Orion: Tuesday, 20 May 2008,

THE NETHERLANDS government has banned the use of electronic voting machines in future elections.

Voting privacy concerns due to the risk of electronic eavesdropping were cited to justify the ban. Dutch election officials will return to using paper ballots that the electorate marks by hand to count the votes in all elections.

In a statement released last Friday evening, the Dutch Ministry of Internal Affairs said, "Research indicates that a secure voting machine that is immune to the risks of eavesdropping can't be guaranteed. Developing new equipment furthermore requires a large investment, both financially and in terms of organization. The administration judges that this offers insufficient added value over voting by paper and pencil."

The government banned both electronic voting machines that store vote counts in memory and those that print out paper voting slips. A group of academic experts assigned to study voting machines concluded that "even with regular testing of each printer, it can't be guaranteed that all devices stay within the required emission limits" to prevent electronic eavesdropping.

http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/05/19/dutch-ban-voting-machines

[Junkdrawer]

1. Here's hoping that it starts a world wide trend....

of course, the US will likely be the last hold out....

[Eric J in MN]

2. Interesting twist. I've never seen the electronic eavesdropping...

...argument stressed that much.

I wish the US voted for president by putting ballots into a transparent container, which is hand-counted in the same room while the public can watch.

[raincity_calling]

3. Electronic eavesdropping?

What are they talking about? Are they talking about using wireless devices to manipulate
votes?

[electropop]

7. They are talking about listening in on the votes,

however, we already know we have a tampering problem with our machines.

[ArbustoBuster]

10. I suspect they're referring to what's called Van Eck phreaking.

It allows an electronic eavesdropper to "listen in" to what your electronic equipment is doing, and recreate what's on your computer screen without even needing to be in the same room with your computer (or your electronic voting machine).

http://www.disappearing-inc.com/V/vaneckphreaking.html

[L. Coyote]

4. We ned to do the same TODAY effective bfore November.

Eavesdropping is a real issue. We have a Constitution that may permit
a challenge on the basis of right to priacy and secret ballot.

[BeFree]

5. HCPB: Human Controlled Paper Ballots

Humans sort and stack paper ballots. Control.

Only part machines should play in elections is counting the number of papers in each stack.

Humans sort the ballots - according to each race - two, three or four stacks per race, as needed.

Then a simple counting machine counts the number of ballots in each stack. Like is done with money after people have sorted the paper dollars in to stacks of ones, fives, tens, twenties, fifties and hundreds.

The similarity is that humans do the sorting, not machines. The machines count only individual pieces of paper and perform no other function.

Hence the term: Human Controlled Paper Ballots.

Cheaper and easier and safer than ever. What do yall think?

[electropop]

6. This is the correct approach.

Of course in our case, the bigger concern is tamperability, which is a known and demonstrated designed-in feature of the machines. It is in fact why the machines were designed in this country.

[Kurovski]

8. K&R. (nt)

[BadgerKid]

9. From article at Ars Technica

The Ministry of the Interior in the Netherlands decided last week not to adopt electronic voting machines. The decision was made after reviewing extensive research which indicated that none of the available machines offered adequate privacy and security safeguards.

Developing new equipment that could meet the government's standards was deemed too costly and challenging. Instead, voters will go old-school: marking their choices on paper ballots which will be tabulated by machines. The government has also ordered periodic testing of the tabulation machines in order to ensure that they are consistently reliable.

"As long as there is no good alternative, Netherlands agrees with pencil and paper," the government said in a statement. "Research shows that there can be no guarantee of voter privacy with new voting devices. Electronic voting would require the development of new equipment and a large investment, both in money and organization. The government considers that this offers little value compared with pencil and ballot votes."

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080521-netherlands-says-nee-to-electronic-voting.html

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I'm just remembering the complaints that arose when the first price code scanners at the grocery stores came out (How could you trust you weren't being overcharged?). Same here.